SCOTLAND.
Mr. Macaulay has accepted the Rectorship of Glasgow University, and has informed the electors that he will visit the Western metropolis about the New Year, for the purpose of being installed. Lord John Russell never had time to go through this ceremony, and it is surmised that his supposed indifference was the cause of his not being reelected, Mr. Lefevre has left Edinburgh, having fulfilled his mission in gathering information about the Annuity-tax and the Fishery Board.
It is with great pleasure we learn that Mr. Black has received intimation, through Lord John Russell, of her Majesty's intention to confer on lain; the honour of knighthood, in acknowledgment of his eminent public ser- vices. We cannot, however, affect to say that we are deeply grieved at Mr. Black having, in accordance with his simple and manly tastes, seen fit t decline the title.--Scotsman.
A meeting has been held at Stranraer, to oppose the endowment of the Romanist priests; and the resolutions against any State endowment of reli- gion passed unanimously.
The Duke of Buceleugh has consented to the erection of a Free Church edifice at Wanloehhead.
A Finance Reform Association has been formed in Edinburgh; the new Lord Provost, Mr. Johnston, appearing at the head of the Provisional Com- mittee. The movement originated with Mr. William Chambers, and every effort is made to keep clear of general politics. Few of the old Whig party have yet joined the Association, and scarcely any of the Con- servatives; the list is for the most part made up of those who voted for Mr. Cowan, or who are Dissenters.
The High Court of Justiciary met at Edinburgh on Saturday last, to dispose of the case of Henry Ranken and Robert Hamilton, whom a Jury lately found " guilty of sedition, in so far that they used language calculated to excite popular disaffection and resistance to lawful authority." On the preceding Saturday, the counsel for the prisoners had opposed the Crown motion for judgment, on the ground that such a verdict was equivalent to one of acquittal. The Jury studiously omitted from their verdict the word "intended," which preceded the words " calculated" in the charge of the indictment. Before passing sentence, the Lords of Jus- ticiary pronounced judgment on this objection. The Lord Justice Clerk thought that to hold this verdict to be equal to "Not guilty," was opposed to sound reasoning and common sense.
He quoted a great number of cases, to show that it was not essential in an in- dictment for sedition to aver that the words were "intended" to produce popular disaffection and resistance to lawful authority; and he contended, that it it was not necessary for the public prosecutor to aver "intention," it was not necessary for the Jury to find such " intention." The crime of sedition consists in wilfully, unlawfully, and to the public danger, using language calculated to produce gene- ral disaffection, disloyalty, and resistance to lawful authority. The law did not look for or require the general dgle, or legal malicious intention or purpose with reference to the precise intent which the words were calculated to produce. If such purpose was also proved, the case would be one of a more aggravated kind of sedition. It was satisfactory to him that the Jury had left out the word in- tended, because it left the case in a less aggravated light.
Lords Mackenzie, Moncrieff, Medwyn, and Wood, coincided " in the mein" with the Lord Justice Clerk. The Lord Justice General was ab- sent. Lord Cockburn was dissentient; and gave his reasons at great length for the objections to sentence, considering the verdict tantamount to an ac- quittal.
He held that there could be no sedition unless there was some direct or indirect guiltiness of intention; that evil intention was indispensable to the commission of the crime. He had looked over all the indictments in the well-known State trials of the last century, and he could not find one in which the wickedness of Mind of the accused was not charged; although, no doubt, the charge was not always framed in the same way. The use of the words averring " wickedness" showed that the prosecutor must have understood that it was necessary for him to embrace it in the indictment; and certainly the intention was not left out in the course of the trial. Assuming that the evidence of intention was essential to the offence, it was the province of the Jury to find it proved; and as they had not done so, he held that there ought to be no straining of the verdict to make it ex- press what it did not do, and least of all when that straining was against the prisoners, and for the benefit of the public prosecutor.
A majority of Judges " repelling " the objections, the sentence of the Court was four months' imprisonment. In pronouncing it, the Lord Jus- tice Clerk said to the prisoners- " I would fain hope and trust—I express it with sincerity, for I have collected, it somehow, I cannot tell how, in the course of this trial, from your whole manner and demeanour—that it is not likely that you will again rashly, wantonly, and, recklessly use such language as you have done on previous occasions."
Janet Anderson, an aged widow of Buttergask, near Dunblane, has been mur- dered by a robber. She kept a little heater's shop: on Sunday sennight, she was found in her house with her skull cleft from a blow with an axe; she was still alive, but speechless, and she died soon after. About 151., mostly in silver, had been stolen. John &limber, an Irishman, who had worked on the Scottish Central Railway, recently lodged with Mrs. Anderson, and knew her habits and what money she had. On him suspicion is strongly fixed. He was seen near the shop on the Sunday afternoon, and then left the place; on the following Tuesday he was arrested at Glasgow: there were marks of blood on his clothes, and a con- siderable sum of silver money was found at his lodgings. It is surmised that Kellochar broke into the widow's house on the Sunday, expecting that she would, as was her general custom, have been at church; but finding her at home, ancl ready to resist his robbing her, he seized an axe and struck her.
A strange accident has happened to a goods-train on the North British Rail- way. Near Cockburn's Path the line runs on a high embankment close to the sea; as the train was passing this, a fierce gale of wind blew off the roof of one of the carriages, on which a guard was posted, and roof and man fell to the base of the embankment. The accident was not discovered till the train arrived at a station. It was feared that the guard had been drowned in the sea; but he was found alive, though seriously hurt.
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